


Speechless

by DCFanGuy



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-11
Updated: 2017-11-11
Packaged: 2019-01-31 20:56:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,620
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12690090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DCFanGuy/pseuds/DCFanGuy
Summary: After the Sirens fail to bring him in, Oswald gets someone else to apprehend Edward for him and as the two former friends face one another, something happens to surprise the both of them.





	Speechless

The most hated man in Gotham! Honk, honk!

Edward Nygma thought it was funny at the time. In fact he still did but if there was one thing even he knew, despite his lapse in intelligence and ability to make a decent riddle these days, it was that someone else didn’t see the funny side of it all.

The someone else of course was Oswald Cobblepot. Oswald was a lot of things to Edward. He was a friend to begin, a boss when he was the Mayor of Gotham and then he became an enemy when Oswald chose to kill someone that Edward had held dear. That was the moment that their friendship had broken and the fact that Oswald was also in love with Edward hadn’t helped matters either.

News had gotten back to Oswald that Edward had been imitating him during the fights in the Narrows to get the crowd going. With Grundy being the main attraction, Nygma knew that stirring the pot with Oswald was a risk but still, it had been one worth taking. Oswald had taken the one thing Edward had treasured more than anything else and that was his mind as well as his freedom for several months when he had been a main attraction at the Iceberg Lounge as a frozen piece of work. If anything, Oswald should be thanking him for not having Grundy tear both him and Zsasz and anyone else on his payroll limb from limb.

Except Oswald didn’t really see the bigger picture. It was how Nygma had been able to fool him a good few times before his frozen debacle. It was also why Oswald had sent Selina, Barbara, Tabitha and even Firefly down to the Narrows in order to kill him. He had Leslie to thank for the fact that none of them got the chance to do it, even after Cherry had betrayed them.

A few hours had passed since he had gotten Leslie to take over the fight club in the Narrows and he was alone in his own room trying to write even the most simplistic of riddles. Instead the only thing he could write was absolute nonsense and after going through half a pad of failed attempts, which resulted in crumbled balls of papers fired at the wall in fury, he had to get out of the Narrows. The place was a dive and even his sparkling personality couldn’t save it.

As he passed by, he could see Grundy deep in thought, muttering the word “Tabby”. His memory of her wasn’t quite there yet but it was a lot closer to him figuring out how to even write a child’s riddle and that angered him as well. Instead of venting his anger at Grundy, he just left him to his thought process and headed outside with the urge to commit even a petty crime. 

He saw a couple walk down the street and was almost tempted to rob them but didn’t. He saw another pharmacy and was tempted to throw a brick through the window but he didn’t. He thought about burning down the GCPD but the thought quickly evaporated. It felt like everyone was a criminal mastermind at this point but not him. He also thought about how a teenager had been able to subdue him so easily and how another one came close to incinerating him on the spot. He knew he was lucky to be alive but he didn’t feel alive, not with his memory the way it was. 

Then he thought of Oswald and he felt something strong burning inside of him. Anger. Imitating Oswald was child’s play, even Grundy could do it but the fact that it provoked such a strong reaction from Oswald made him smile. Suddenly things didn’t seem so bad after all and with that Edward moved with a spring in his step, as thought he could burst into song.

Of course while Edward had been full of joy, he hadn’t noticed that for the last few blocks, a white van had been following him ever so carefully. When Nygma stopped to look inside the window of a toy shop he found himself distracted by the display of puzzle boxes, some rather intricate looking ones as well. Oswald had given him one before when he was in Arkham. That made him pause for a moment before he saw two burly looking men coming into his direction.

“You Edward Nygma?” one of the men said, a gruff looking guy in his mid forties. The other guy with him looked a few years younger but similarly unkempt.

“Who wants to know?” Edward managed to say before being punched in the face by the second guy.

“You have a date with destiny, Riddle Boy,” the second one said as the pair of them grabbed Edward and dragged him into the back of the van, closing the door quickly.

The driver soon drove off with absolutely no-one showing even the mildest of concern that a former criminal mastermind had been taken off the street in broad daylight.

Oswald Cobblepot was not a patient man. He had told everyone that he didn’t want to be disturbed and made sure that there was absolutely no-one in the Iceberg Lounge except for him. He had so many pressing matters that he needed to deal with but right now, only one of them was of the upmost concern. 

He had left the front door of the club open and had knocked the rest of his drink. He soon heard a van park up where he had instructed them to and within another minute, he could hear footsteps.

“Well, it’s about time,” Oswald said impatiently, before pointing at his watch. “Better late than never I guess.”

Inside the club was now the driver of the van, holding tightly onto a tall thin man whose hands were bound tightly behind his back whilst gagged with a strip of duct tape over his mouth and blindfolded with a black cloth.

“You can remove the blindfold,” Oswald said smirking before observing the man standing before him. “He might not be able to come up with a decent riddle but he certainly knows where he is. Don’t you, Ed?”

The blindfold removed, a bound and gagged Nygma just looked at Oswald. He was squirming but trying his best to give an air of impatience as though he wasn’t fearful for his life. It actually amused Oswald and even the driver that was still holding tightly onto Ed’s arm.

“You can go now,” Oswald said, his tone was enough for the driver to know not to cross him.

“Good luck, chump,” the driver gave Nygma look that conveyed that he didn’t envy the Riddler’s current position as he left and closed the door behind.

Edward watched as Oswald then locked the door, making sure there was no way for him to run out into the street for help. Oswald then stood in front of him, sizing him up and down as Nygma struggled in his bonds.

“Well now that we’re alone old friend, there was something that was on my mind,” Oswald smiled and before Ed could try to mumble anything he received a vicious slap to the face. 

Edward recoiled and grunted before facing Oswald again with a seething look on his face. However Oswald wasn’t in the slightest bit intimidated by Nygma’s look of anger. Both of them knew who was holding all the cards in that moment. 

“For once, Ed you’re going to listen,” Oswald said, making sure that Nygma knew he meant business. “After all the things we’ve done to each other, I was willing to put our differences aside and let you live out your miserable shadow of an existence. I thought you had suffered enough. I thought losing your ability to make a riddle would help you learn something but clearly being frozen did more to addle your insane mind than I thought it would.”

My insane mind? Edward thought incredulously as Oswald paced up and down with him as a captive audience forced to listen to childish rants. You absolute hypocrite!

Unfortunately Edward had to listen to Oswald drone on and on and on about everything. Nothing was ever Oswald’s fault, Nygma thought with annoyance. Oswald could never see that the reason why so many people turned on him – Fish, the GCPD, Butch, Barbara, Tabitha and by the sounds of it this Sofia Falcone girl that he was also going on about length until the conversation circled back to Ed himself and the ridicule he had subjected Oswald to with his performance piece in the Narrows. If only he could find some way to actually shut Oswald up.

“I know what you’re probably thinking,” Oswald smirked, coming down from his rage, standing still and facing Nygma, even going so far as to grab Edward by the tie and pull him closer. “How am I going to kill you exactly?”

Edward gave him a look that made Oswald think he was right, while still wondering how to keep him quiet for once.

“You know what, old friend?” Oswald smiled as though he was about to burst into a fit of laughter. “I honestly don’t know but it’s past time an example was made out of you, Edward Nygma. Now what do you have to say for yourself?”

Oswald ripped the tape off Edward’s mouth with such roughness the latter couldn’t help but wince. He stared Oswald square in the eye.

“Oswald,” Edward began with the words just shut up on the tip of his tongue but in the end he did something else altogether that made the both of them speechless. 

\---- The End ----


End file.
